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The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir
The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir
The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir
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The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

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Meet the Grogans

Before there was Marley, there was a gleefully mischievous boy navigating his way through the seismic social upheaval of the 1960s. On the one side were his loving but comically traditional parents, whose expectations were clear. On the other were his neighborhood pals and all the misdeeds that followed. The more young John tried to straddle these two worlds, the more spectacularly, and hilariously, he failed. Told with Grogan's trademark humor and affection, The Longest Trip Home is the story of one son's journey into adulthood to claim his place in the world. It is a story of faith and reconciliation, breaking away and finding the way home again, and learning in the end that a family's love will triumph over its differences.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHarperCollins
Release dateOct 6, 2009
ISBN9780061980886
The Longest Trip Home: A Memoir
Author

John Grogan

John Grogan is a columist for The Philadelphia Inquirer and former edtior in chief of Organic Gardening magazine. He lives with his wife and three children and their dog, Gracie, in the Pennsylvania countryside, USA.

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Rating: 4.24 out of 5 stars
4/5

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This beautiful memoir celebrates the beauty of a perfectly ordinary life and is truly a love song to family and an ode to unconditional love. Grogan writes with clarity, insight, sensitivity, and great humor about the normal experiences and hiccups of growing up and breaking away, of becoming oneself despite fears of disappointing parents and failing to meet expectations. I laughed my way through most of the book and found tears rolling down my cheeks as I read the closing sections. This is an incredibly moving story that is a testament to the idea that all of our life stories deserve to be told.Full review at The Book Lady's Blog
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    John Grogan, author of Marley and Me, has written a memoir of his life growing up in a suburb of Detroit. His parents raised their four children to be devout Catholics, but the kids weren't always cooperative. John probably skipped more masses than he attended. His mother's mode of home decor was 'Catholic church chic'--statues and pictures of Mary and Jesus and crucifixes were in every room. In addition to the humorous events in John's young life are poignant interchanges with each of his parents as he reaches his twenties and thirties. Many of us are getting to the age where we are becoming our parents' caretakers. Grogan opens his family's door and lets us see how deftly he handled that stage in his parents' lives.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    An excellent story told so well!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I enjoyed this very much. It may be due to my Catholic school childhood less than 10 miles from the author's home, at the same time he was growing up there. I enjoyed the references to local places, and kept reading to see if I knew any of the people he mentioned.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A touching and compelling memoir by the author of "Marley & Me", which I prefer somewhat, but this is pretty good. Grogan's life and upbringing parallel my own in many ways, which added resonance for me, and his father's decline and dying transpired with a firm dignity and love of family that struck me as a pretty decent way to go. Much about Grogan's father reminded me of my own Dad, now 82. We're not exactly touchy-feely either, and it would be nice to be able to do something about that the way I saw John Grogan and his father did as death came ever closer. Grogan has a knack with endings; I did not finish "Marley & Me" or this book dry-eyed.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The Longest Trip Home is another wonderful book by author John Grogan. John takes us through his idyllic childhood into his antics as a teenager. We see his struggles with his VERY Catholic parents over religion and his struggles within himself about religion. We see him emerge as a journalist working in newspapers all over the country. He meets the girl of his dreams and starts a family (with a dog!). And, of course, he becomes a best-selling author!Yes, the end of this book brought tears, as did his previous book, Marley and Me (which I loved). This book brought my own memories of growing up and my own struggles to become a person my parents would be proud of. Some parts made me smile, others made me thoughtful, and yes, some even made me cry. A lovely book about a loving family.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "The Longest Trip Home"by John Grogan is really three books in one. The first book accurately and humorously describes growing up in a devout Catholic family. The second book realistically discusses the author's sometimes painful transition from being his parent's child to becoming his own person. The third, and I think the most powerful book, is the last one. It poignantly chronicles the aging of Mr. Grogan's parents and his relationship with them as they declined. Even though the author often did not agree with them, this section really honors his parents, their enduring marriage, and lifelong religious beliefs. I found this section very moving, and read it with a box of Kleenex nearby.I would enthusiastically recommend "The Longest Trip Home", especially for those readers (like myself) who have elderly parents.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This is the story of John Grogan and his life growing up in a devout catholic home and progress's with him through the years into adulthood and starting a family of his own. I waited to read Marley and Me until I finished this book which was great. There was a back story with a touch of Marley included in the book.I found there to be some very funny areas in this book and would recomend those that have read Marley and Me to enjoy this book as well. The author gives you the same feeling in this book as he did in Marley and Me.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I loved Marley and Me by Grogan, and while The Longest Trip Home took me longer to get into, once I did I enjoyed this book as well. Grogan recounts his childhood in a very Catholic home. His parents made sure that he and his siblings had a strong religious background, yet as an adult Grogan falls away from the church. This book explores Grogan's relationship with God and his family as he marries, has his own family and eventually watches his father pass away.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    There's hardly any mention of Marley in The Longest Trip Home. M&M was an autobiographical slice of Grogan's life - a 12 year period when he was newly married and started a family. In TLTH he goes Big Picture, and starts from the beginning until his father's death shortly before the publication of his blockbuster best seller. While M&M focuses on his wife and kids (and of course the crazy canine) this book looks largely back on his childhood friends, first girlfriends, his fiance Jenny again, but most particularly his parents. In fact, the overarching theme of this book is his lifelong struggle to reconcile his lack of religiosity with his parents steadfast Catholic faith. TLTH, as in M&M, seamlessly blends laugh out loud hilarity with poignant and sadder reflections on the pains of growing up, growing apart, and growing old. However, just as M&M was not by and large a sad book (though I spoke to several dog lovers who avoided reading it because they had heard it was) neither, as a whole, is TLTH. Ultimately, it is about the power of family and the love that can endure between parents and children despite the struggles and conflicts
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The title had me thinking of John leaving his faith and then coming back to embrace it. Was I caught off guard. The book was about his life growing up and maturing into an adult. His passions and thoughts were reviewed and enjoyablely noted. Heartwarming and comical yet never made that crossover to real truth with his parents.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Wow! After coming to accept that people my age are now writing their memoirs (and have had enough life to come to some realizations worthy of a memoir), I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The family life, the schools, the issues of the time, are all fully and realistically described. The joy, the angst, the losses and the successes of growing up, of growing older, are wonderfully shared. This ranks as one of the most enjoyable and touching non-fiction books I've read in a long time. Thank you for sharing this journey with us, John Grogan!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I definitely enjoyed the first half of this book much more than the second. The stories from Grogan's childhood were far more interesting to me than his struggles with faith or the conflicts this caused between himself and his parents. A bit self-indulgent (there's really nothing all that special about his life story) and verbose at times, but not enough to make me want to stop listening. I almost cried at the end but the Catholic-guilt laden prose stopped me. On a more personal note, I CANNOT STAND THE SOUND OF JOHN GROGAN'S VOICE. GET SOMEONE ELSE TO READ THE AUDIO FOR GOODNESS SAKE!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Well-known for his heartwarming and charming book about his mischievious, entertaining, and wholely unrepentant dog, Marley, in Marley and Me, Grogan has written an equally charming story about his childhood and coming of age as a son in The Longest Road Home.Growing up in suburban Detroit to devout Catholic parents, Grogan's memoir opens with his mother waking the four children for their summer vacation, driving to see a saint's shrine 7 hours away. This sort of religious devotion was a part and parcel of Grogan's idyllic childhood. He went to Catholic school, served as an altar boy, and attended Mass almost daily. But he was definitely not a sedate Catholic school boy, drinking the communion wine, trying to grow a marijuana plant in his garden, coming up with ways to torment the neighborhood's crotchety old man, and publishing an underground student newspaper among other boyish misdeeds. He chronicles high jinks and high spirits and his parents' unwavering faith in and unstinting loyalty to him, despite his "stretching" of the truth.Grogan doesn't shy away from admitting that he falls away from his parents' faith early and only maintains a facade for them because he doesn't want to disillusion them. As an adult, he starts to make more and more choices at odds with the Church's teachings and it is only through looking dispassionately at his choices and at why he has made them, despite his parents' disappointments, that he comes to a full sense of who he is and how he is still inextricably bound to his loving and forgiving family. While he may not have grown into the faithful Catholic they had hoped to raise, I feel certain that his parents were and are proud of the man he became.In some way, Grogan has written a memoir of every man. His mother and father are vividly and lovingly drawn. His rambunctious childhood reflects so many others' and highlights the best of a middle class Midwestern upbringing. There is a sweet poignancy in his chronicling, a hearkening back to a sweet and uncomplicated time. But there is a desperation as well, especially once the memoir moves into the realm of John's adulthood. The reader knows that his octogenarian father's advancing leukemia is dangerous and terrifying and that his parents' advancing ages, slowing down, and the scattering of his siblings and his childhood friends are all inevitable parts of his life.Beautifully written, this is a paean to a past childhood, to his parents' faithful religion, and to the coming of age of a son who is resigned to not being the man his parents envisioned but who is a good human being even so. Like Marley and Me, this is an accessible and charming memoir and readers will not regret an afternoon spent with the Grogan family.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Grogan, of Marley & Me fame, returns to his youth here. As a young boy born into a devout Catholic family, Grogan grows to question his faith. He struggles for acceptance from his parents, even as he separates from them as a man with little religious conventions. Sweet, funny, sad and touching, this memoir shows how love and opposing religions can co-exist.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Just like Johnny Grogan, I was one of those "good Catholic boys." I could relate to almost all of it - the first confession and communion, the stinging rulers and strict discipline of the teaching nuns (in my case the School Sisters of Notre Dame), the family rosary nights on our knees in the living room during Lent, the altar boy sacristy and sanctuary shenanigans, the confusing onset of puberty with its secret struggles with the sin of "self-abuse" and the half-truths of weekly confessions, and then, finally, as a young man, the guilt-wracked break from all of it. It's very obvious, with the publication of THE LONGEST TRIP HOME, that there's a lot more to John Grogan than that "dog book" which (justly) made him famous. Marley, that notorious "world's worst dog," barely merits a mention in this richly textured memoir of growing up Catholic and working middle class in a northern Detroit suburb. Like me, Grogan attended Catholic school for nine years. His years at the Our Lady of Refuge parish elementary school were mostly happy, with his childhood chums, Tommy, Rock, Sack and Doggy. But his transition to Brother Rice, a prestigious Catholic high school in another town was neither happy nor easy. After a year of this lonely exile, his parents - always perceptive when it most mattered - allowed Grogan to transfer back to West Bloomfield, the local high school where his friends had all gone. This was the beginning of his semi-stoner phase of adolescent rebellion, marked by brushes with local law enforcement and clashes with school officials. During this time he also learned to lie glibly to keep his parents happy. Yes, the good Catholic boy was learning to be bad. Grogan holds nothing back, he is painfully honest about everything in this book, which is precisely what makes it so good! He tells of his first high school kiss, a battle between tongues, lips and metal braces, which leaves him temporarily scarred - and made me laugh out loud. There are more such stories, of teen parties and lost virginity, of newfound popularity, of childhood friends drifting apart. But that's really all just in the first part of the book. The second part - college (CMU, where he cleans up his act and graduates with honors), work and finding true love - is equally honest in all the humor, heartbreak and pathos that is youth. But it is unquestionably the third part of the book that moved me the most. In it, Grogan struggles mightily to reconcile his differences with his still extremely religious parents, and finally, the wrenchingly sad portrayal of his father's final illness. There are a few stand-out scenes in this third, final portion of the book, although all of it is eloquently and heartbreakingly told. One is the evening that John gets out his camcorder and spends two hours interviewing and filming his father, hurting from the tortures of chemotherapy, as he talks about his life, some parts of which the son had never heard. "For two hours Dad talked as I recorded. He described the early blissful years of their marriage in a one-bedroom apartment in Detroit with a cardboard box for a dining-room table. He described their first house, on Pembroke Street in Detroit, and how he built a sandbox in their tiny backyard ... He filled me in on everything he could think of that came before the point where my own memories began. Then he said, 'I'm feeling a little tired now,' and I turned off the camera and watched him, cane in hand, slowly climb the stairs to his bedroom." Another hard scene to read is John sitting at his childhood home one night alone with his alzheimer-ravaged mother, his father in the hospital. It's just five days before Christmas. They talk idly of how there's no snow yet, but maybe soon. "That's when she began to sing. Soft and reedy, her weak voice carrying a certain warble, as if coming from a tiny bird or a little girl. 'I'm dreaming of a White Christmas ...' I marveled at my mother's mind. From what part of her far-away mind had the song surfaced? I had not heard her sing 'White Christmas' in decades ... Neither of us knew more than the first verse, so we sand it over again. Over and over. When she had sung all she wanted, she stopped and sighed. 'That Bing Crosby, heavens how he could sing,' she said, and then she was asleep in her chair, the silence again enveloping us." The third, and most unforgetttable scene for me was John Grogan's last one-sided conversation with his dying, nearly comatose father. This from a man who thought he had lost his faith, to a man for whom faith had been central to his life for nearly ninety years: "Dad ... Jesus is going to take you home today. In just a little while, he's going to take you." Reading this, my eyes filled with tears, I continued to read John Grogan's last words to his dad, telling how much he loved him. And I remembered, weeping, my last meeting with my own father, who was also dying of cancer. My family, like the Grogans, never found it easy to say, 'I love you.' So I didn't tell my dad that last time I saw him. How I wish I had. But I can't tell you how many times I have told him in the twenty years since then - in my head, in my heart: I love you, Dad. I miss you. You were the best. John Grogan seized that moment: "'Dad, you know how much I love you. I love you so much ... I know you love me too ... Dad, it has been an honor to be your son. I am so honored and so proud.' I swallowed hard, fighting to maintain composure. 'An honor.'..." All families are dysfunctional. The Grogan family, in spite of its perhaps extreme "Catholic-ness," was no different. But make no mistake. There was always love in this family. John Grogan never doubted that and demonstrates its in this loving memoir and family portrait. The book is completed, but Grogan is, I believe, still on a journey, making that "longest trip home." I hope he shares more of it with us.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I have to say I really enjoyed this book. Coming from a family with deep religious values myself, it was interesting to read how his faith permeated his life and his relationship with his parents. I was never sure where the book was going, but I enjoyed the ride and the author's humor. The ending was especially touching as the author recounts his experiences with aging parents. Audio version is read by the author.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I loved Marley and Me because I am a dog person and have had many of the experiences John Grogan wrote about. Having grown up without the influence of religion, I was skeptical that I would find much to relate to or enjoy in The Longest Trip Home. Turns out The Longest Trip Home is a beautifully written book about the relationships between parents and their children. It’s about love, disappointment, and accepting people for who they are. None of these are action packed themes and this book's plot is far from fast paced, but Grogan draws you in and makes you feel like a member of his family until you care deeply what happens in the end. His writing style is so smooth and easy to read that you reach the end before you know it. You can expect to shed some tears, but you can expect to laugh a little too.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is an enchanting story. I read Marley and Me and loved it, so I was happy to find that John Grogan had written another book. The Longest Trip Home is a simple story of a loving family. That alone makes it somewhat unique as so many of todays memoirs tell of abuse and neglect and love rarely enters in. Grogan has a sort of conversational way of writing that makes you feel as if the story being told is just for you. No pretense, no long tangents that leave you wondering why.. just good solid story. This book takes you from his very Catholic upbringing in a cozy sounding little town, to the moment that most defines us as adults. The death of a parent. He shares the good and the bad, although the bad is perhaps better described as the not so good. His life was fairly typical for the time. A little struggle with the rules, a little pot and memorable friends. I liked Grogan's own family when I read Marley, and This book tells the tale of how John became the man and the father he is today. Love and support being the backbone of his youth. There were no laugh out loud moments as there were in Marley and Me, but there were certainly smile and and nod with understanding moments all through. Oh, and there was of course, a dog.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The Longest Trip Home is a heartwarming and highly readable boy-next-door memoir about growing up Catholic in 1960s-70s suburban Detroit. It’s also about growing independent from family and away from faith, and, decades later, facing parental health declines.Simply written and straightforward in structure, the book’s appeal is its universality -- that every ordinary life is filled with interesting and meaningful moments. That said, Grogan sometimes seems to lose sight of the reader while the book segues into more of a Grogan family-history project than a memoir for public consumption. Still, his story is fun and touching and like mine in so many ways that I recommended this book to my siblings and cousins.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I absolutely loved Marley & Me so I jumped at the chance to read this book and I wasn't disappointed. John Grogan is an incredible writer with the gift of pulling the heartstrings. While reading this memoir it seemed as if I was constantly laughing, cringing with embarrassment for John or tearing up. I highly recommend this book to all readers of both fiction and non-fiction and it’s a must for anyone who read Marley & Me.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    In The Longest Trip Home, John Grogan maps his journey from his idyllic suburban childhood with his fiercely Catholic parents into his adulthood as a journalist attempting to reconcile his own worldview with his parents' faith. Grogan's childhood in suburban Detroit is the epitome of everything his Catholic parents didn't have in their own childhoods' and wished for their children to have. Their chosen neighborhood is full of green backyards, features a private beach of sorts shared by the whole neighborhood, and most importantly contains a Catholic school to educate their four children. Grogan's childhood is marked by his rebellions both small and large against his parents' rigidly held but well-intentioned Catholic morals. Though Grogan loves and respects his parents and sees them for the good people they are despite and perhaps because of their pious meddling, he can't seem to grasp their faith. Nonetheless, he paves over his indiscretions and lack of belief with lies big and small until, as he grows older and leaves for college, he realizes that he is living two lives in a desperate attempt not to disappoint the people he loves most. When the truth begins to come out, John and his parents will have to find away to cross the divide between his two lives.The Longest Trip Home is a finely wrought tale of growing up. Grogan's anecdotes of his childhood and teenage antics as well as his pleas to God to deliver him from the consequence of his comical missteps are laugh out loud funny. Much more profound, though, is his chronicle of growing up and beginning to understand his parents for who they are and to understand himself in what he cannot share with them. Even so, his story is filled with the love and respect he has for his parents both as a child under their discipline and as an adult who knows that he will never share the intense faith that pervades his parents' lives. Grogan's story comes full circle as he returns, with his brothers and sister, to sit at his father's death bed, and it is here that the book is at its most powerful. John's last moments with his father are rendered so poignantly that I found myself crying as if I knew them both personally. Grogan's memoir is a quiet but powerful tale of what would be an ordinary life and an ordinary family were they not made extraordinary by their great love and Grogan's exemplary writing.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Grogan does not disappoint with his second book. The Longest Trip Home is everything you would expect from the man who captivated America. It is funny, poignant, reminiscent, & heart wrenching all at the same time.The Longest Trip Home tells about Grogan's life growing up with very devout Catholic parents. The Grogan's didn't take vacations to amusement parks or national landmarks. They visited Holy Shrines & locations where The Blessed Virgin was sighted. Grogan tells tale after tale of his upbringing. From his first confession :"There was only one thing I could do. "Forgive me Father, for I havesinned. This is my first confession."Then I lied my ass off."To skipping out on Mass & attending the Church of John & Tim. John shares with us his life growing up. And his slow separation from the Church that defined his childhood. He shares with us the strife that his defection caused between he & his parents. And how the Church even caused friction between his wife & his parents. But make no mistake, there is not a single bit of maliciousness about his feelings. The Longest Trip Home is not a "I Hate Catholicism" book. It is a book about his relationship with his parents. And how Catholicism played an integral part in that relationship. There are millions of "lapsed Catholics" out there. I guess you could say that I am included in that statistic. Our parents raised us to be "Good Catholics". To attend Mass every Sunday, to never miss a Holy Day. To pray the Rosary when times get tough. And we can relate to Grogan when he skips Mass, yet tells his parents that he goes weekly. Been there, done that.And like all children have to do, there comes a time when the roles become reversed & John & his siblings must care for their parents. Make arrangement & take care of them in ways that they were once taken care of. The Longest Trip Home is an amazing story. John Grogan knows how to tell the tales with the best of the Irish Men. He does not disappoint he readers with his efforts. If you grew up in a large Catholic family, The Longest Trip Home needs to go on your Christmas list. You will thank me later.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    John Grogan has done it again. He’s written a book that is sure to cause others to laugh and cry. I liked this book a wee bit less than Marley and Me, but not that much less. Grogan writes, not only about his life, but about common themes in everyone’s lives. The most notable theme, was his strict Catholic upbringing and the measures he took to finally separate from his parents and become his own person. There is much to laugh about, yet there is also much be serious about when religion has as firm a grasp on a family as Catholicism had on John Grogan’s. No matter the strife it caused during his formative years, the bottom line turned out to be that, within Grogan’s family, each member always had much respect for one another and their love for each other carried them shining through to the end. Get your hankies ready, readers.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    spoiler alert: I laughed, got the warm fuzzies a lot, and cried like a big baby. I love this book, it kind of reminds me of my family, especially the Catholic aspect. Thank you
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Memoir about John Grogan being raised outside of Detroit in a very Catholic household and how he got into trouble, didn't practice his faith, and then relied on it later in life. OK book, in my opinion, not great.

Book preview

The Longest Trip Home - John Grogan

Preface

The call came on a school night in the autumn of 2002. Jenny was out, and I was fixing dinner for our three children, who were already at the table. I grabbed the phone on the third ring.

John! My father’s voice boomed through the earpiece. He sounded exceptionally buoyant. At eighty-six, Dad was quite the physical specimen. Just as when he was a young man, he began each morning with calisthenics, including forty push-ups. He always loved the outdoors and still cut his own acre of grass, gardened, shoveled snow, and climbed on the roof to clean the gutters. Dad bustled up and down the stairs of his home with a teenager’s vigor and routinely got by on six hours of sleep. His handwriting was as neat and controlled as on the day he went to work as a draftsman for General Motors in 1940, and he honed his mind each night by breezing through the crossword puzzle in the newspaper as he ate peanuts in his trademark way—with chopsticks so he wouldn’t get his fingers greasy.

There was never enough time in each day for everything he wanted to get done, and fourteen years shy of becoming a centenarian, he joked that someday when life settled down, he would get to all that leisure reading on his list. When I retire, he’d say.

Hey, Dad, I said. What’s up?

Just checking in, he said. How’s everyone there? I gave him quick updates on the kids, told him we were all fine. We chatted aimlessly for a few minutes as I carried the pasta and sauce to the table.

I placed my hand over the mouthpiece. It’s Grandpa, I whispered to the children and motioned to them to dig in.

Everyone says hi, I told him.

Say, he said, pausing just a little too long, I need to talk to you about something.

Is Mom okay? I asked.

It was my mother we all worried about. Over the years she had grown weak and fragile. Her hips and lower back had deteriorated, rendering her all but immobile. And in recent years her memory had begun to slip. Dad had become her full-time caregiver, helping her bathe and dress, and doling out a daily regimen of medications that was comical in its quantity and complexity. Always the engineer, he kept track of them all with a meticulous flowchart. There were pills for her heart, for her diabetes, for her arthritis, for her aches, for what doctors said were the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Despite Dad’s characteristically upbeat tone, with every phone call I wondered if this would be the one with the bad news.

Mom’s fine, Dad said. Mom’s doing all right. It’s me. I got a little bad news today.

You did? I asked, stepping out of the kitchen and away from the kids.

It’s the darnedest thing, he said. I’ve been feeling a little run-down lately, but nothing worth mentioning. Just kind of tired.

You have a lot on your plate, taking care of Mom and the house and everything.

That’s all I thought it was. But a few days ago I took Mother in to Dr. Bober for her regular checkup. The doctor took one look at me and asked, ‘Are you feeling okay? You look washed out.’ I told her I was a little worn down but otherwise fine, and she said, ‘Well, let’s get you tested just to make sure you’re not anemic.’

And?

And the results came back, and sure enough, I’m anemic.

So they give you iron or something, right?

They can treat the anemia, but there’s more to it. The anemia is just a symptom of something a little more serious.

He hesitated a moment, and I could tell he was choosing his words carefully. After my blood work came back, Dr. Bober said she wanted to rule out some other things and sent me in for more tests. He paused. They show I have a kind of leukemia, and—

Leukemia?

Not the bad kind, he said quickly. There’s acute leukemia, which is what you think of when you say leukemia—the kind that can kill so quickly. I don’t have that. I have something called chronic lymphocytic leukemia. It’s just lying there in my bloodstream not doing anything. The doctors say it could sit there dormant for years.

How many years? I asked.

Anywhere from a couple to ten or twenty, Dad said.

My mind raced to process everything I was hearing. So that’s good, right? I asked. It may just sit there for the rest of your life.

That’s what the doctor said: ‘Go about your life, Richard, and forget about it.’ I should try not to worry and they’d treat any symptoms, like the anemia, and monitor my blood every four months.

How are you doing on the ‘try not to worry’ front? I asked.

So far pretty good, he said. I just want to stay healthy so I can take care of Mother for as long as she needs me.

Standing phone to ear from three states away, I felt a swell of optimism. Dad always bounced back. He had bounced back from the heart attack he suffered shortly after retiring from General Motors and from prostate cancer after I was married. Dad, a man who greeted adversity with stoic determination, would bounce back from this, too. The sleeping cancer would simply be something to monitor as my father marched vigorously into his nineties, holding together the strands of the life he and my mother had spent more than a half century building together.

It’s really nothing, Dad assured me. I’m going to follow doctors’ orders and try to forget about it.

That’s when I asked: Dad, what can I do?

Not a thing, he insisted. I’m fine. Really.

Are you sure? I asked.

Absolutely, he said and then added the one request that was so deeply important to him, the one thing that seemed so simple and effortless, and yet the one I had such difficulty delivering to him.

Just keep me in your prayers, he said.

PART ONE

Growing Up

Chapter 1

Wake up, little sleepyheads."

The voice drifted through the ether. Wake up, wake up, boys. Today we leave on vacation. I opened one eye to see my mother leaning over my oldest brother’s bed across the room. In her hand was the dreaded feather. Time to get up, Timmy, she coaxed and danced the feather tip beneath his nostrils. Tim batted it away and tried to bury his face in the pillow, but this did nothing to deter Mom, who relished finding innovative ways to wake us each morning.

She sat on the edge of the bed and fell back on an old favorite. Now, if you don’t like Mary Kathleen McGurny just a little bit, keep a straight face, she chirped cheerily. I could see my brother, eyes still shut, lock his lips together, determined not to let her get the best of him this time. Just a tiny bit? An eeny teeny bit? she coaxed, and as she did she brushed the feather across his neck. He clamped his lips tight and squeezed his eyes shut. Do I see a little smile? Oops, I think I see just a little one. You like her just a tiny bit, don’t you? Tim was twelve and loathed Mary Kathleen McGurny as only a twelve-year-old boy could loathe a girl known for picking her nose so aggressively on the playground it would bleed, which was exactly why my mother had chosen her for the morning wake-up ritual. Just a little? she teased, flicking the feather across his cheek and into his ear until he could take it no more. Tim scrunched his face into a tortured grimace and then exploded in laughter. Not that he was amused. He jumped out of bed and stomped off to the bathroom.

One victory behind her, my mother and her feather moved to the next bed and my brother Michael, who was nine and equally repelled by a girl in his class. Now, Mikey, if you don’t like Alice Treewater just a smidgen, keep a straight face for me… She kept at it until she broke his resolve. My sister, Marijo, the oldest of us four, no doubt had received the same treatment in her room before Mom had started on us boys. She always went oldest to youngest.

Then it was my turn. Oh, Johnny boy, she called and danced the feather over my face. Who do you like? Let me think, could it be Cindy Ann Selahowski? I grimaced and burrowed my face into the mattress. Keep a straight face for me if it isn’t Cindy Ann Selahowski. Cindy Ann lived next door, and although I was only six and she five, she had already proposed marriage numerous times. My chin trembled as I fought to stay serious. Is it Cindy Ann? I think it just might be, she said, darting the feather over my nostrils until I dissolved into involuntary giggles.

Mom! I protested as I jumped out of bed and into the cool dewy air wafting through the open window, carrying on it the scent of lilacs and fresh-cut grass.

Get dressed and grab your beer cartons, boys, Mom announced. We’re going to Sainte Anne de Beaupré’s today! My beer carton sat at the foot of my bed, covered in leftover wallpaper, the poor man’s version of a footlocker. Not that we were poor, but my parents could not resist the lure of a nickel saved. Each kid had one, and whenever we traveled, our sturdy cardboard cartons doubled as suitcases. Dad liked the way they stacked neatly in the back of the Chevrolet station wagon. Both of them loved that they were completely and utterly free.

Even in our very Catholic neighborhood, all the other families took normal summer vacations, visiting national monuments or amusement parks. Our family traveled to holy miracle sites. We visited shrines and chapels and monasteries. We lit candles and kneeled and prayed at the scenes of alleged divine interventions. The Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré, located on the Saint Lawrence River near Quebec, was one of the grandest miracle sites in all of North America, and it was just a seven-hour drive from our home outside Detroit. For weeks, Mom and Dad had regaled us with tales of the many miracles of healing that had happened there over the centuries, beginning in 1658 when a peasant working on the original church reported a complete cure of his rheumatism as he laid stones in the foundation. The Lord works in mysterious ways, Dad liked to say.

When I got downstairs with my packed beer carton, Dad already had the tent trailer, in which we would sleep on our expedition, hooked to the back of the station wagon. Mom had sandwiches made, and soon we were off. Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré did not disappoint. Carved of white stone and sporting twin spires that soared to the heavens, the basilica was the most graceful, imposing building I had ever seen. And inside was better yet: the walls of the main entrance were covered with crutches, canes, leg braces, bandages, and various other implements of infirmity too numerous to count that had been cast off by those Sainte Anne had chosen to cure.

All around us were disabled pilgrims who had come to pray for their own miracles. We lit candles, and then Mom and Dad led us into a pew, where we dropped to our knees and prayed to Sainte Anne, even though none of us had anything that needed fixing. You need to ask to receive, Mom whispered, and I bowed my head and asked Sainte Anne to let me walk again if I ever lost the use of my legs. Outside, we climbed the hillside to make the Stations of the Cross, pausing to pray at each of the fourteen stops depicting an event in Jesus’ final hours. The highlight of the visit was our climb up the twenty-eight steps that were said to be an exact replica of the steps Christ climbed to face Pontius Pilate before his crucifixion. But we didn’t just climb the steps. We climbed them on our knees, pausing on each one to say half a Hail Mary aloud. We went in pairs, Mom and Dad first, followed by Marijo and Tim, and behind them, Michael and me. Step One: Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou amongst women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. As we uttered the name of Jesus, we bowed our heads deeply. Step Two: Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, amen. Then we moved to the next step and started again. Over and over we recited the prayer as we slowly made our way to the top, Michael and I jabbing each other and crossing our eyes to see who could make the other laugh first.

On our way to the parking lot, we visited the gift shop, where I picked out a snow globe with Sainte Anne inside. Mom filled a bottle from a spigot behind the cathedral, figuring it had to be as holy as the water from Lourdes and other miracle sites. The parish priest would later bless it for her, and she would keep it in the linen closet and bring it out whenever we were sick with a particularly stubborn fever or sore throat or earache, touching the water to our foreheads or throats or ears and tracing a sign of the cross.

On the way home, Mom and Dad played the honeymoon game, which always delighted us kids no end. Get down low, children, out of sight! Mom coached and slid over in the seat up close to my father, resting her head on his shoulder and planting little kisses on his neck and cheek as he drove, both hands on the wheel and a quiet grin on his face. Dad wasn’t one for displays of affection—he sent each of us off to bed at night not with a hug or a kiss but with a firm handshake—yet he seemed to enjoy the honeymoon game as much as the rest of us.

Smooch smooch, Richie, Mom cooed.

We four kids lay in a heap on the backseat, looking up at them in lovebird mode and squealing at our clever subterfuge. Every passing motorist surely thought our parents were newlyweds on their honeymoon. Little did any of them know that the smooching couple already had four children hiding in the backseat and giggling with abandon. Here comes another car, we’d scream in unison. Kiss him again! Kiss him again! And Mom would gladly comply.

Another successful family miracle trip was coming to an end. We had camped out in the crisp Canadian air, thrown rocks in Lake Ontario, eaten my mother’s famous pork and beans cooked over an open fire, and prayed our way up twenty-eight steps on our knees. Life was safe and warm and good. I had parents who loved God and each other and us. I had two brothers and a sister to play and run and fight with. I had a house and toys and my own beer carton in which I could carry anything I wanted. Best of all, I had the comforting knowledge that if anything ever did go wrong, there was always Sainte Anne de Beaupré just a day’s drive away, ready to use her miraculous healing powers to make everything right again. It was a dreamy, wondrous time.

Chapter 2

My parents met in 1947, shortly after my father returned from four years on an aircraft carrier in the South Pacific. A year to the day later, they were married, and just weeks after that, expecting their first child.

Before they set off on the road to parenthood, though, they made a pact that each of their offspring would be named after either the Virgin Mary or her husband, Saint Joseph, who had selflessly taken on all the responsibility of fatherhood without any of the fun of procreation. Immaculate conception was a given in our household, with no room for debate. The Holy Spirit had miraculously planted the seed of God’s only begotten son into the Virgin Mary’s womb. Uncomplaining Saint Joseph took it from there. Even as a little boy, I thought this terribly unfair.

My sister, the eldest, got the Daily Double of Catholic names. My parents baptized her Mary Josephine, later shortened to Marijo. Next came Timothy Joseph and Michael Joseph.

But before the boys there was another girl, one who didn’t make it. My parents baptized her Mary Ann, even though she never took a single breath. The only one ever to see her, and then only for a few moments, was my father, who described her as perfect in every way, like a flawless porcelain doll. Hospitals administered anesthesia to women delivering in those days, and when my mother finally awoke, my father was waiting at her bedside searching for the words to tell her. He would never forget the look on her face in the instant she opened her eyes. She was radiant, a smile spreading on her lips, her eyes widening with joyous expectation. Then he squeezed her hand and said, Ruthie, our baby’s with the Lord now.

They cried and prayed and told themselves this was God’s plan and there had to be a reason she was in heaven already before she ever had a chance to experience life on earth. Then they arranged for a Catholic burial, her tiny casket resting to this day between my grandparents’ graves in Ann Arbor.

I came along in 1957. John Joseph. Mom and Dad were hoping I would be a Saint Patrick’s Day baby. When I missed that date, they rooted for Saint Joseph’s Day, which would have been fitting, given all our middle names. Late again. When I finally arrived on March 20, I had other bragging rights. I came into the world on the first day of spring.

Mom called me her little daffodil.

Right from the start, Mom’s little daffodil was no wallflower. Maybe it was the Cap’n Crunch cereal I devoured in vast quantities each morning, so sugary it made my teeth tingle. Maybe it was simply being the youngest of four and doing what was necessary to hog as much of my parents’ attention as possible. Whatever the reason, I was born with abundant energy and few tools for containing it. My earliest memories are of racing through the house like a miniature tornado, shrieking joyously at the top of my lungs. Sometimes Dad would simply swoop me off my feet and hold me off the ground, legs still pumping, until I calmed down enough that I wouldn’t hurt myself. On one of my runabouts through the house, I grabbed Mom’s broom and held it over my head like a knight with a lance. Stop! Now! Mom ordered. I did, but only after the broom struck the large glass globe hanging from the foyer ceiling, sending it showering down on me in a thousand shards.

That night at dinner, Dad pulled out his stopwatch and said, Johnny, we’re going to try a little test. I want you to sit perfectly still for one full minute.

Not a word, not a wiggle, Mom added. It was clear they were convinced I could not do it.

The first try, I lasted twelve seconds. Then thirty. Eventually I made it to sixty seconds, sitting there, grinning and twisting my face up, thinking this new game was great fun. The instant Dad clicked off the stopwatch and said, Why, I’ll be doggoned, he did it, I shot out of my chair like a Saturn space rocket and orbited the living room several times, pinging off the furniture.

In kindergarten the teacher noted my need to practice self-restraint and helped by frequently sending me to the corner to sit alone. She called Mom to come get me only on special occasions, such as the day I used two of my fingers like a fork to poke a classmate in the eyes, just like Moe did to Curly in my favorite show of all time, The Three Stooges.

When we got home after that incident, Mom said to me as she did after so many of them: Johnny, go get George.

Mom was a firm believer in the power of spankings to modify behavior, and George was her enforcer. Before George had a name, he was simply the laundry stick, a thin board about eighteen inches long and two inches wide that Mom used to poke the clothes down into the suds in the washing machine. Johnny, go get the laundry stick, Mom would say, and I knew what was coming, a crack across the backside.

Then one evening, my father treated us to dinner at a fancy restaurant, and all four of us kids, giddy with excitement, would not settle down. Mom was too embarrassed to let the other diners overhear her threatening her children with a spanking, so from thin air she pulled two names. Looking at Marijo, she asked matter-of-factly, as if issuing pleasantries: Would you like a little visit from Suzie when we get home? And from her tone and the look in her eye, Marijo figured out right away that a visit from this Suzie person would not be pleasant.

Then she leveled her calm gaze at my brothers and me. And boys, how would you like to meet my friend George? Subtlety being lost on me, I screamed out, Sure! Then Mom added: You remember George, don’t you? My friend who lives in the laundry room? Suddenly I didn’t want to meet George anymore.

When we got home, she wrote the words on the stick in permanent marker where they remained for years, even as the soapy wash water faded them to gray: George on one side, Suzie on the other. From that day forward, the George-and-Suzie Spanking Stick was an effective part of Mom’s arsenal. Usually a mere threat of a visit from George or Suzie was all that was needed to pull us back into line, but when punishment was required, Marijo always got her spanking on the Suzie side and the boys on the George side. The stick struck fear in the hearts of all four of us, even though Mom’s whacks—and they always came from Mom, Dad not having the stomach for any type of corporal punishment—weren’t much harder than love taps. That didn’t stop me, however, from stuffing my pants with multiple copies of National Geographic to cushion the blow. I thought I was being outstandingly clever, but whenever Mom spotted a bulky load in my britches, she simply lowered her aim, to the back of my thighs.

Our neighborhood was known as Harbor Hills, though it really had neither. What it did have was a pair of gentle slopes on my street and a small man-made boat basin carved out by bulldozers between the two not-quite-hills.

The boat basin fed through a channel into Cass Lake, one of the largest inland bodies of water in metropolitan Detroit and unquestionably the biggest selling point of Harbor Hills, which consisted of three streets arranged in a sort of caste system in relation to the water. Only those fortunate enough to have waterfront lots could actually see the lake from their homes. These homes were large and glorious beyond description, and the people who lived in them were doctors and lawyers and business owners. Elsewhere in the neighborhood, on the landlocked lots, the dads tended to work in more middle-income professions. They were draftsmen and insurance agents and plumbers, and of course, automobile workers. Many, many of them, my father included, were gainfully employed by one of Detroit’s Big Three—General Motors, Ford, or Chrysler. The farther away from the water you got in the neighborhood, the more modest the houses became.

But there was a great equalizer in Harbor Hills, and that was The Outlot.

The Outlot was a sort of grassy public space—not quite a park but more than a mowed field—covering a few acres right on the water. It surrounded the boat basin and was set aside by the developer for the exclusive use of the neighborhood. No matter how far back in the neighborhood you lived, you still had a piece of lake frontage to use as your own. There were big shade trees and picnic tables and, best of all, a small, stony beach with a raft and roped-off swimming area, where every kid in the neighborhood spent virtually every waking moment between Memorial Day and Labor Day. It was nothing fancy, but it was a beach, and that’s all that mattered. The boat basin, universally known as The Lagoon, was lined with rickety wooden docks, and every house in the neighborhood was assigned one side of a dock. When you bought in Harbor Hills, you were getting more than just a suburban home on three-quarters of an acre. You were getting a waterfront lifestyle without the cost of a waterfront home—a place to swim and sunbathe and water-ski and picnic with the cool lake breezes in your face. My parents never experienced anything close to this growing up during the Great Depression, and like all good parents, they wanted more for their kids. They saved for years to move us out of the city to this Shangri-la on the shore. When you were lounging by the water on a perfect summer’s day, it was hard to believe the gray, belching auto plants of Pontiac were just a ten-minute drive away.

In the summer, we swam and swam and swam. My brothers and sister and I were soon true amphibians, as comfortable in the water as out. This was a point of immense pride for my father, a landlocked city kid who only learned to swim, and then not well, when he joined the navy after Pearl Harbor. For my mother, who never learned to swim at all, it was simply a mystery. But summer wasn’t the only season when we gathered in The Outlot. In the winter, we shoveled the snow off The Lagoon and skated until our legs ached and our toes were numb. We skated in the daylight, and we skated at night, the ice illuminated by the glow of rudimentary floodlights rigged to a nearby power pole. Sometimes one of the dads would build a warming fire next to the ice, and we would huddle around it, all runny noses and rosy cheeks, our breath rising in steamy clouds. In the spring and fall, the kids of the neighborhood—and there were dozens of us—were again down at the water, hanging out, goofing off, soaking our shoes, throwing sand at each other, and skipping stones. Every Easter there was a neighborhood egg hunt, and every Labor Day the annual Harbor Hills picnic, the highlight of which was the decorated bike parade. There were games and hot dogs and root beer on tap and, best of all, coal-roasted corn on the cob dipped in melted butter. The dads roasted the corn and ran the games; the moms anchored the potluck and dessert tables.

But Cass Lake was only half of what lured my parents to Harbor Hills. The other half, an even more powerful draw for them, was Our Lady of Refuge. They believed fervently in their duty to raise their children as devout Catholics. That meant not only Mass every Sunday—a nonnegotiable—but Mass on as many weekdays as possible, too. It meant receiving the holy sacraments of confession and communion and confirmation. It meant evening rosaries and Stations of the Cross, altar-boy training and staying up for Midnight Mass on Christmas. It meant smudged foreheads on Ash Wednesday and a Catholic education from the knuckle-rapping, hair-tugging, ear-twisting Sisters of Saint Felix in their brown habits and starched white face boards. The nuns, Mom and Dad assured us, were building our character.

Our house was three doors from Our Lady of Refuge, and my mother could stand at the living-room window and watch us march across the backyards, not losing sight of us until we entered the back door of the school. They had worked hard and saved relentlessly to move here, but they never regretted a dime of the cost. This, they were convinced, was the perfect place to raise a family. Many of our neighbors were just like my parents, practicing Catholics drawn to the neighborhood’s twin attractions.

The beach and the church were the two poles of our universe. All life, all activity seemed to gravitate around one or the other. We were either at the beach or at Our Lady of Refuge—in school or in church or waiting for confession or playing soccer or hardball on the athletic fields. Either that or we were on our bicycles riding between the two.

To say my parents were devout Catholics is like saying the sun runs a little hot. It defined who they were. They were Catholics first, and then Americans and spouses and parents. Right from the start, their relationship was forged in their mutual devotion to Jesus and the Blessed Mother. One of their earliest dates was Mass followed by a rosary. As a kid hearing my mother tell the story for the umpteenth time, I could only sit, mouth agape in something approaching mortification, thinking, Oh my God, I have the squarest parents in the universe.

For fun, my siblings and I would sometimes count the Virgin Marys in the house; at one point we were up to forty-two. They filled every room, and they were not alone. Commingling with them were various likenesses of Jesus, Joseph, John the Baptist, Francis of Assisi, and an assortment of other saints and angels. There were crucifixes everywhere you turned in our house, the anguished, dying son of God staring down at us from the cross as we ate breakfast, brushed our teeth, and watched television. There were priest-blessed candles and holy water and palm fronds. Rosaries were scattered about in ashtrays and candy bowls. It was like living in a religious supply store. We even had an emergency Holy Communion kit, consisting of an aged oak box lined in purple velvet containing a silver chalice, a silver platter to hold communion wafers, two candleholders, and a cross. I had no idea where it came from, but it looked official and could be pressed into service by visiting priests who might want to say Mass at our dining room table. This happened more often than one might think.

My mother was constantly inviting priests to the house, and once she got them there, inviting them to give a group blessing or lead a prayer or say Mass. The priests, knowing a home-cooked meal would follow, seldom refused. She was a gifted cook, and her promise of good food even managed to lure a couple of bishops. We kids treated them like rock stars, taking turns dropping to our knees and kissing the big rings on their hands. It helped that two of Mom’s brothers were priests. Father Joe and Father Vin, as we all knew them, visited often and, especially in the summer months, brought priest friends along

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